Here is an interesting study that doesn’t exactly back up the whole morality comes from religion theory.
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Excerpt:
In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion in the prosperous democracies
Moral education can come from a lot of different places and is certainly not limited to religious teachings. A study comes to my mind where a group of orphans who had never met their parents or been taught ethics were closely studied for moral and amoral behavior. What the researchers discovered was a tendency for orphans to choose immoral behavior, but also a palpable number which did not steal/act violently and often helped others including sick children.
What these special individuals discovered was a moral grounding separate from the fearful religious doctrine of “Do what’s right because god has commanded it”. As your passage describes, the author states that judea christian moral behavior is taught on this very principle which rewards good behavior and admonishes bad behavior for it’s consequences. And yet, If some people are naturally drawn to these “good” tendencies without ominous warnings, does this mean that to truly be good you only need to value the rewards of kindness, forgiveness, charity, and all around moral behavior. The answer is simple: you can act “good”, or you can truly understand what it means to be a noble person and reap the rewards.
To get back to your question, the concept of god does have a way of escaping some people and often seems complicated. However, Moral grounding is ultimately founded in how you relate to people and not a supernatural deity. Many Atheists or “naturalists” understand that all to well.
[quote]orion wrote:
ephrem wrote:
…altough i haven’t read that wall of text, i do like to chime in and say; be a moral person because you want to be, not because you are commanded to…
Obviously you do not see the emotional core of this.
The author wants to know why the fuck he should be a good boy when all the bad ones are driving Ferraris and fucking models.
He is wrestling with his soul.
There being a God that kicks him in the nads for eternity if he does not behave would help immensely.
I think his need for a dominant male as a herd animal is somewhat at odds which his philosophical insights.
I recommend pot.
[/quote]
I think people confuse doing nice things and being nice. I maybe more liberated than most people, but I find that the Bible is very freeing. There is very few things that are restricted in the Bible. And knowing the foundation of the Word allows you to feel immensely freed. I drive a big truck and a fast car, as well as have a few girlfriends (which are very beautiful). I however cannot see how I broke the first and second commandment (which all the rest stem from) except for a few times when I was younger and stole candy or something.
I think the world has become to sensitive. I recommend everyone smoke or consume some pot and just care about themselves and look out for their neighbor (read: does not mean control your neighbor). Honestly, if God talks about pagans as having a righteous life than who am I to judge someone. Just do not think you can tread on me because I believe in God.
[quote]Cockney Blue wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Cockney Blue wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Cockney Blue wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Cockney Blue wrote:
If you really think that Morality comes from Religion then you are saying that every religious person holds back from murdering, raping and stealing only because of their religion. Clearly this is ridiculous and humans have an innate sense of morality. This makes sense in evolutionary terms as groups of people living together will historically have tended to be genetically linked therefore genes that select for some form of morality will increase their chances of being propagated.
The morality will change based on environmental conditions or the genes selected for. Such a morality isn’t normative at all, but merely descriptive.
Of course it is normative
Things that “change over time” are not a normative standard. If one group of people decides wiping out another group will help them produce more offspring, their genes will propagate and so will their system of morality.
You either don’t know what “normative” means or you don’t know how evolution works, or both.
OK a group doesn’t decide to propagate their genes by wiping out another group therefore it is clearly you that struggles with the concept of evolution.
Normative just means tending to an ideal standard, that standard can change as conditions change so it would appear you also struggle with your understanding of Normative.
LOL. Wut?
Genes such as lactose tolerance propagated because they allowed nomads on the Asian steppe to wipe out neighboring groups because their warriors could bring more food with them on long campaigns. Their genes propagated. From the standpoint of natural selection, they were selected. They were also brutal with their neighbors.
I’m starting to wish you were as smart as you think you are, C_B. A standard that “changes with conditions” really isn’t any standard at all. “Today, I’m hungry. I think I’ll go out and take food from someone else by force. Yesterday, I was full, so I didn’t.”
You stated ’ If one group of people decides wiping out another group will help them produce more offspring, their genes will propagate and so will their system of morality.’ as an example of evolution by natural selection. This implies to me that you have a shaky hold on Evolution by Natural Selection.
[/quote]
I’m quite certain that my hold on it is better than yours. Add the Bantu expansion to my thesis as well, which resulted in the virtual destruction of pygmies and hottentots in Sub-Saharan Africa.
This is a complete dodge of the examples I gave you. From an evolutionary standpoint, a person is “successful” if his offspring survives. Survival of my offspring may or may not involve killing my neighbor and taking his stuff, which has been repeated countless times throughout history and is even found in genomes of various groups around the world. Ghengis Khan, for example, was a brutal guy but very successful from an evolutionary standpoint. He has millions of descendants. Should we all start imitating him?
[quote]
Not too long ago, to see a woman in trousers would be considered immoral, these days we have no issue with it. Our moral standards here have changed over time.[/quote]
The question is not whether they have changed but what ought to have changed. That’s the entire point of this thread which you seem not to have grasped: what is vs. what ought.
You can really only express your morality in terms of things you prefer to do based on experiences you have. Someone else, like Stalin for example, could express completely opposite preferences and would have as much right to do so and act according to them.
Who determined what was “moral and amoral”? You can’t even have that study without a system of ethics upon which to base it. How did these naturalists arrive at their system of ethics?
This is another fun study
http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/darley_samarit.html
Excerpt:
The amount of “hurriness” induced in the subject had a major effect on helping behavior, but the task variable did not (even when the talk was about the Good Samaritan).
Overall 40% offered some help to the victim. In low hurry situations, 63% helped, medium hurry 45% and high hurry 10%. For helping-relevant message 53%, task relevant message 29%. There was no correlation between “religious types” and helping behavior
[quote]Cockney Blue wrote:
Here is an interesting study that doesn’t exactly back up the whole morality comes from religion theory.
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Excerpt:
In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion in the prosperous democracies[/quote]
Youth suicide is an exception to the general trend because there is not a significant relationship between it and religious or secular factors.
In some cases the highly religious U.S. is an outlier in terms of societal dysfunction from less theistic but otherwise socially comparable secular developed democracies.
The U.S. is therefore the least efficient western nation in terms of converting wealth into cultural and physical health.
Pressing questions include the reasons, whether theistic or non-theistic, that the exceptionally wealthy U.S. is so inefficient that it is experiencing a much higher degree of societal distress than are less religious, less wealthy prosperous democracies.
So they are not even sure what all this means, and you are proof texting. I thought to be on level playing ground I would proof text some things to go against yours. Something I have always wanted to say is that just these a lot of these surveys I have been part of can be skewed, if asked if you are religious most people in the US will say they are because of the lack of anonymity. That does not mean they believe in God, just means they are religious. Also social pressure can skew these people to say yes even if they do not.
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
Cockney Blue wrote:
Here is an interesting study that doesn’t exactly back up the whole morality comes from religion theory.
http://moses.creighton.edu/JRS/2005/2005-11.html
Excerpt:
In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy, and abortion in the prosperous democracies
Youth suicide is an exception to the general trend because there is not a significant relationship between it and religious or secular factors.
In some cases the highly religious U.S. is an out lier in terms of societal dysfunction from less theistic but otherwise socially comparable secular developed democracies.
The U.S. is therefore the least efficient western nation in terms of converting wealth into cultural and physical health.
Pressing questions include the reasons, whether theistic or non-theistic, that the exceptionally wealthy U.S. is so inefficient that it is experiencing a much higher degree of societal distress than are less religious, less wealthy prosperous democracies.
So they are not even sure what all this means, and you are proof testing. I thought to be on level playing ground I would proof text some things to go against yours. Something I have always wanted to say is that just these a lot of these surveys I have been part of can be skewed, if asked if you are religious most people in the US will say they are because of the lack of anonymity. That does not mean they believe in God, just means they are religious. Also social pressure can skew these people to say yes even if they do not.[/quote]
Even if you take the US out of the mix, the trend is for more morality in developed countries that have lower levels of religiosity.
I would guess that religion drives morality in undeveloped countries or societies but once development and education gets beyond a certain level it becomes a negative influence.
[quote]Cockney Blue wrote:
This is another fun study
http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/darley_samarit.html
Excerpt:
The amount of “hurriness” induced in the subject had a major effect on helping behavior, but the task variable did not (even when the talk was about the Good Samaritan).
Overall 40% offered some help to the victim. In low hurry situations, 63% helped, medium hurry 45% and high hurry 10%. For helping-relevant message 53%, task relevant message 29%. There was no correlation between “religious types” and helping behavior[/quote]
Great. What does this have to do with the thread topic? All you’re doing is providing more description of what people do, not what they ought.
Also, I object to the fact that these scientists needed to borrow a Christian morality parable to put in their study. Couldn’t they use some scientific naturalist text instead of the Bible?
[quote]PRCalDude wrote:
Atheists are, by definition, naturalists. This is taken from Gordon Clark’s book “A Christian Philosophy of Education:”
[/quote]
Not necessarily. Most “atheists” I have run into are just confused. For instance, a lot of New Agers think they are atheists because they are not Christians and don’t believe in a personal God but end up being as superstitious as any illiterate serf.
One of the ideas I have been toying with has been the concept, pointed out well by Steven Pinker, that a game theoretic approach to social interactions pretty much has optimal strategies jiving with old fashioned morality. “Thou shalt not murder”* is a pretty good summation. Seen in this light, various sets of vices and virtues (normally 7 in the West, but I believe 5 in China) are a taxonomy of selfishness.
I maintain that Christianity is grossly misunderstood from a simply practical perspective. It has a very good applied psychology for dealing with good and bad behavior, plus it does allow for a place to stick things we don’t understand.
As for helping others, I would point out that the Carnegie Hero’s fund does keep track of statistics on who is heroic and the most damning thing ever is that over the last 20 years there has been a demographic shift. A person most likely to intervene at risk to themselves is not determined by religious belief, but by education – and of roughly 300 recipients in the last 20 years, 4 or so had been to college. The rest were not. Think about that people. Don’t forget that roughly 40% of the general population attends college at least for a while. A century ago, education played no role in who would sacrifice themselves for their fellow man. The conclusion, I think, is that something in higher education destroys a sense of right and wrong. Is this what we really want? I doubt seriously that it should be counted as progress. Since, for one thing, college graduates generally will end up running the country and are supposed to make decisions in the best interest of all, this is a frankly scandalous statistic.
And as always, I might just be full of shit…
– jj
[quote]jj-dude wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Atheists are, by definition, naturalists. This is taken from Gordon Clark’s book “A Christian Philosophy of Education:”
Not necessarily. Most “atheists” I have run into are just confused. For instance, a lot of New Agers think they are atheists because they are not Christians and don’t believe in a personal God but end up being as superstitious as any illiterate serf.
One of the ideas I have been toying with has been the concept, pointed out well by Steven Pinker, that a game theoretic approach to social interactions pretty much has optimal strategies jiving with old fashioned morality. “Thou shalt not murder”* is a pretty good summation. Seen in this light, various sets of vices and virtues (normally 7 in the West, but I believe 5 in China) are a taxonomy of selfishness.
I maintain that Christianity is grossly misunderstood from a simply practical perspective. It has a very good applied psychology for dealing with good and bad behavior, plus it does allow for a place to stick things we don’t understand.
As for helping others, I would point out that the Carnegie Hero’s fund does keep track of statistics on who is heroic and the most damning thing ever is that over the last 20 years there has been a demographic shift. A person most likely to intervene at risk to themselves is not determined by religious belief, but by education – and of roughly 300 recipients in the last 20 years, 4 or so had been to college. The rest were not. Think about that people. Don’t forget that roughly 40% of the general population attends college at least for a while. A century ago, education played no role in who would sacrifice themselves for their fellow man. The conclusion, I think, is that something in higher education destroys a sense of right and wrong. Is this what we really want? I doubt seriously that it should be counted as progress. Since, for one thing, college graduates generally will end up running the country and are supposed to make decisions in the best interest of all, this is a frankly scandalous statistic.
And as always, I might just be full of shit…
– jj
Your remarks about heroism and education are interesting. I would have to agree. The best people I tend to meet are blue collar. For that reason, most of my closest friends tend to be blue collar.
The educated nerd set tends to be aspergery and devoid of basic humanity.
The study that correlated religious belief and negative social outcomes is missing one obvious factor: IQ.
The Japanese have the highest IQ. It stands to reason, then, that they would be the most indoctrinated in the scientific naturalist zeitgeist as IQ tends to beget higher levels of education. Same for the European countries. People with higher IQ tend to employ better native judgment and are less subject to negative social outcomes in general.
The United States is a much, much different story than Europe and Japan. It is more religious, to be sure. But it is also the most diverse of any of the other countries mentioned. The other countries are far more homogeneous.
Mexicans and blacks have an estimated IQ of 89 and 85, respectively, and have the most social pathologies and the highest crime rate in the United States. The white murder rate in the US, for instance, is no different than that in European countries despite differences in religiosity.
The United States is less than 2/3 white at this point and we import people from the third world with high degrees of social pathologies, despite their religiosity. Was this factored into C_B’s little study?
[quote]PRCalDude wrote:
A study comes to my mind where a group of orphans who had never met their parents or been taught ethics were closely studied for moral and amoral behavior.
Who determined what was “moral and amoral”? You can’t even have that study without a system of ethics upon which to base it. How did these naturalists arrive at their system of ethics? [/quote]
I don’t think the researchers were referring to some system of ethics like the commandments, but rather observing the behavioral patterns of the children and classifying their actions as positive or negative. I mentioned children stealing and others helping cold or sick friends stay healthy and warm. As I stated in my first post morality can simply be defined as an individuals effect on others, be it positive or negative.
[quote]PRCalDude wrote:
Cockney Blue wrote:
This is another fun study
http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/darley_samarit.html
Excerpt:
The amount of “hurriness” induced in the subject had a major effect on helping behavior, but the task variable did not (even when the talk was about the Good Samaritan).
Overall 40% offered some help to the victim. In low hurry situations, 63% helped, medium hurry 45% and high hurry 10%. For helping-relevant message 53%, task relevant message 29%. There was no correlation between “religious types” and helping behavior
Great. What does this have to do with the thread topic? All you’re doing is providing more description of what people do, not what they ought.
Also, I object to the fact that these scientists needed to borrow a Christian morality parable to put in their study. Couldn’t they use some scientific naturalist text instead of the Bible?
[/quote]
It again shows that religion is not the fount of morality which was what the original article hypothesised.
And as the scientists were specifically testing this point it obviously made sense to use a passage from the bible as their source of inspiration for the test.
[quote]PRCalDude wrote:
jj-dude wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Atheists are, by definition, naturalists. This is taken from Gordon Clark’s book “A Christian Philosophy of Education:”
Not necessarily. Most “atheists” I have run into are just confused. For instance, a lot of New Agers think they are atheists because they are not Christians and don’t believe in a personal God but end up being as superstitious as any illiterate serf.
One of the ideas I have been toying with has been the concept, pointed out well by Steven Pinker, that a game theoretic approach to social interactions pretty much has optimal strategies jiving with old fashioned morality. “Thou shalt not murder”* is a pretty good summation. Seen in this light, various sets of vices and virtues (normally 7 in the West, but I believe 5 in China) are a taxonomy of selfishness.
I maintain that Christianity is grossly misunderstood from a simply practical perspective. It has a very good applied psychology for dealing with good and bad behavior, plus it does allow for a place to stick things we don’t understand.
As for helping others, I would point out that the Carnegie Hero’s fund does keep track of statistics on who is heroic and the most damning thing ever is that over the last 20 years there has been a demographic shift. A person most likely to intervene at risk to themselves is not determined by religious belief, but by education – and of roughly 300 recipients in the last 20 years, 4 or so had been to college. The rest were not. Think about that people. Don’t forget that roughly 40% of the general population attends college at least for a while. A century ago, education played no role in who would sacrifice themselves for their fellow man. The conclusion, I think, is that something in higher education destroys a sense of right and wrong. Is this what we really want? I doubt seriously that it should be counted as progress. Since, for one thing, college graduates generally will end up running the country and are supposed to make decisions in the best interest of all, this is a frankly scandalous statistic.
And as always, I might just be full of shit…
– jj
Your remarks about heroism and education are interesting. I would have to agree. The best people I tend to meet are blue collar. For that reason, most of my closest friends tend to be blue collar.
The educated nerd set tends to be aspergery and devoid of basic humanity.
The study that correlated religious belief and negative social outcomes is missing one obvious factor: IQ.
The Japanese have the highest IQ. It stands to reason, then, that they would be the most indoctrinated in the scientific naturalist zeitgeist as IQ tends to beget higher levels of education. Same for the European countries. People with higher IQ tend to employ better native judgment and are less subject to negative social outcomes in general.
The United States is a much, much different story than Europe and Japan. It is more religious, to be sure. But it is also the most diverse of any of the other countries mentioned. The other countries are far more homogeneous.
Mexicans and blacks have an estimated IQ of 89 and 85, respectively, and have the most social pathologies and the highest crime rate in the United States. The white murder rate in the US, for instance, is no different than that in European countries despite differences in religiosity.
The United States is less than 2/3 white at this point and we import people from the third world with high degrees of social pathologies, despite their religiosity. Was this factored into C_B’s little study?
[/quote]
Only problem is that if you standardise the IQ testing for language using phrases that are more common in black or latino communities there is no difference in IQ between US whites, blacks or latinos.
And as I have stated, take the US out of the mix and you still have exactly the same pattern. In developed countries, higher degree of religiosity correlates with higher amounts of antisocial behaviour.
Of course this is a correlation not a causation. There is no proof that religion causes anti-social behaviour. Possibly antisocial behaviour drives people to Religion. However the evidence refutes the claim that religion leads to morality.
[quote]Cockney Blue wrote:
Of course this is a correlation not a causation. There is no proof that religion causes anti-social behaviour. Possibly antisocial behaviour drives people to Religion. However the evidence refutes the claim that religion leads to morality.[/quote]
It can’t refute it since it can’t define morality.
Moral education can be grounded in any number of anchors.While religion can certainly be one,it is not the only one.
…using religion as the moral yardstick is foolishness. Religious morality can justify about any immoral act you can think of. No, for moral guidance you’d best stay away from religion alltogether, in fact, if you’re in need of moral guidance i’d say there’s something wrong with you…
[quote]Cockney Blue wrote:
Only problem is that if you standardise the IQ testing for language using phrases that are more common in black or latino communities there is no difference in IQ between US whites, blacks or latinos.
[/quote]
I see your understanding of IQ testing is about as solid as your understanding of natural selection, both of which tell us uncomfortable things about humanity.
[quote]Cockney Blue wrote:
PRCalDude wrote:
Cockney Blue wrote:
This is another fun study
http://faculty.babson.edu/krollag/org_site/soc_psych/darley_samarit.html
Excerpt:
The amount of “hurriness” induced in the subject had a major effect on helping behavior, but the task variable did not (even when the talk was about the Good Samaritan).
Overall 40% offered some help to the victim. In low hurry situations, 63% helped, medium hurry 45% and high hurry 10%. For helping-relevant message 53%, task relevant message 29%. There was no correlation between “religious types” and helping behavior
Great. What does this have to do with the thread topic? All you’re doing is providing more description of what people do, not what they ought.
Also, I object to the fact that these scientists needed to borrow a Christian morality parable to put in their study. Couldn’t they use some scientific naturalist text instead of the Bible?
It again shows that religion is not the fount of morality which was what the original article hypothesised.
And as the scientists were specifically testing this point it obviously made sense to use a passage from the bible as their source of inspiration for the test.[/quote]
So they couldn’t even come up with a study of their own without stealing Christian intellectual capital. Pretty sad. Surely, there are atheistic naturalist texts from which they could borrow?
[quote]PRCalDude wrote:
The educated nerd set tends to be aspergery and devoid of basic humanity.
[\quote]
I’m and educated nerd and I’m anything but devoid of humanity.
Mostly because it doesn’t exist. :o) On top of this, I really want to see a cite that shows that people who are religious are anti-social. I suspect that it is people who are self-righteous that are and there is a world of difference between them.
Look, IQ was supposed to measure an immutable thing called intelligence. The issue is that intelligence is not a thing, it is a combination of factors – one of the most important of which is learning. The finely graded IQs of various ethnic groups are, well, racist. Sorry, but I’m going to call you on this. (You’ll have to convince me that all of thinking can be reduced meaningfully to a single number and that you have a reliable way to measure it. Best of luck, 'cause you’re gonna need it pal.)
On top of this, smarter =/= better native judgment, nor less negative social outcomes. One more time, I am on faculty at a major university and am a career Scientist. I can point you to any number of sleezebags with advanced degrees and very smart people that should defer all matters of common sense to their dog.
I’ll spell it out a bit more. The point of my digression is that optimal group strategies mostly correspond to morality. As such, short-term goals and dynamics can overwhelm other considerations. Said another way, rational thinking and morality are on different approaches and social considerations can and usually do trump rational ones. For instance, why do we obsess about, say , abortion issues when there are many others that could occupy us? Because many people have a strong moralistic feeling about this and are consequently immune to a rational discussion. Even is a wholly reasonable solution to the problem were proposed, on moral/ethical/religious grounds people might well oppose it. Rational thought did not get them to their opinions, so rational thought will not change their thinking.
The Enlightenment was really an attempt to try and put rational thought above simply rationalizing. At the time, moralizing was largely confined to religion, but Idealism in the 19th century gave rise to a number of competing secular moral movements (“isms”, like socialism, communism, positivism, &c., &c. and “social preachers” were a fixture of progressive movements everywhere.) The unrelenting hostility of a lot of these movements to Christianity is because they are really extensions of it and are trying to supplant it. The split on government and religion in the US Constitution was an excellent idea, but it could not have been foreseen that secular movements would supplant religions in the next century. A more reasonable modern ban would be a separation of state and social justice movements…
And as always, I might be full of shit…
– jj